Oven liner



June 12, 1962 B. HuRKo 3,038,462

OVEN LINER Filed July 21, 1960 INVENTOR. BOHDAN HURKO by Z.

HIS ATTORNEY United States The present invention relates to range ovens for domestic use and particularly to a means of mounting the oven liner in a range cabinet so as to reduce the heat loss between the front of the oven liner, the oven door, and the cabinet.

In the past, the standard method of supporting an oven liner in a range cabinet has been to provide an outwardly directed flange around the open throat of the oven liner and utilize a pair of adjustable hooks extending through the back wall of the cabinet which would engage the back side of the oven liner and pull the liner into the cabinet so that the flange would be braced tightly against the front wall of the cabinet. The present invention is related to the art of automatic heat cleaning of the inner walls of the oven liner by raising the temperature within the oven cavity to around 800 950 F. which is about 400 F. higher than the standard maximum cooking temperature as is described in my co-pending application Serial No. 27,926, filed May 9, 1960 and assigned to the same assignee as is the present invention. The purpose of the extremely high temperature is to burn off the food particles and grease spat-terings that naturally accumulate on the oven liner. One difficulty experienced with such a heat cleaning operation is that the temperature of all of the walls of the oven should be heated to the heat treating temperature, because if the temperature drops appreciably, around any area as at the oven door due to heat lost from the oven then all of the soil in the cooler area will not be removed. The present invention represents a successful attempt at mounting the oven liner so as to reduce to a minimum the heat loss from around the oven door.

The principal object of the present invention is to provide a sliding mounting means for an oven liner at points remote from the door opening of a range so as to isolate the liner thermally from the range cabinet.

A further object of the present invention is to provide a novel mounting means for an oven liner so the liner may be completely assembled in a range cabinet from the front of the cabinet.

A further object of the present invention is to provide an oven liner which is supported in a range cabinet at a minimum of widely spaced points away from the door opening so as to reduce the likelihood of heat conduction from the oven liner to the cabinet while at the same time providing a rigid structure that can be roughly handled in shipment.

A still further object of the present invention is to provide a novel breaker frame for insulating the oven liner from the range cabinet and the oven door.

A preferred embodiment of the present invention includes an oven cavity formed by an oven liner and a front opening door. The oven liner has a bottom wall, parallel side walls, a top wall and a back wall. The front of the oven liner is open for gaining access to the oven cavity. Thermal insulation surounds the oven cavity and an outer cabinet structure surrounds the insulation as in a standard free-standing range. This invention however may be adapted equally as well for a built-in wall oven or the like. The problem is to mount the oven liner in the cabinet so as to eliminate the draining ofi of any substantial amount of heat in the walls of the oven liner by conduction to the range cabinet. This may be done by supporting the oven liner away from the door opening atent and at only several widely spaced points having a relatively small area of contact. One example is to have slide rails on the inner walls of the cabinet and brackets fitted to some of the outer walls of the oven liner for sliding support on the rails. Adjustable clamping means are pro vided between some of the brackets and the slide rails for adjusting the position of the oven liner with respect to the outer cabinet as well as for fastening the oven liner in place.

In the preferred embodiment of this invention means are provided to close the gap between the front periphery of the oven liner and the range cabinet from which it is spaced. This is desirable for appearance sake as well as to form a seal between the oven door, the range cabinet and the oven liner to prevent smoke, heat and odors from being emitted from the oven cavity. For these purposes, I propose to use a continuous breaker frame that serves as a collar and has insulating gaskets on both edges so that the metal breaker frame is insulated from the oven liner, the range cabinet and the oven door by the gasket material. Also, preferably quick connect fastening means will be used for holding the breaker frame against both the oven liner and the range cabinet.

My invention will be better understood from the following description taken in connection with the accompanying drawing and its scope will be pointed out in the appended claims.

FIGURE 1 is a fragmentary isometric view of an oven liner and a method of mounting the liner to a range cabinet according to the teachings of the present invention.

FIGURE 2 is a fragmentary top plan cross-sectional view taken just below the top wall of the oven liner and showing a bracket of the oven liner slidably supported on a slide rail of the range cabinet, as well as a quick connecting method for fastening the breaker frame to the range cabinet.

Turning now to a consideration of the drawing and in particular to FIGURE 1, 10 represents an oven liner that is provided with a bottom wall 11, side walls 12, a top Wall 13 and a back wall (not shown). The front of the oven liner is open and it is adapted to be closed by an oven door 14. The oven liner is designed to be blanketed with thermal insulation 15 such as fiberglass to hold as much of the heat within the oven cavity as is possible. Finally, surrounding the insulation is the range cabinet 16 as in standard range designs which provides a decorative outer construction for the oven and supports the insulation and oven liner in place.

Means must be provided for supporting the oven liner 10 in the range cabinet 16. This need is met by a pair of slide rails 17 formed on the inner walls of the cabinet and extending from front to back thereof. The outer side walls 12 of the oven liner 10 each include a pair of support brackets 18 which are adapted to slide onto the rails 17 and support the weight of the oven liner. Each slide rail 17 is an elongated angle iron member having a vertical flange 19 and a horizontal flange 20. A front portion of the vertical flange 19 is welded or otherwise fastened to a vertical support member on the cabinet 16 as at 21. The rear portion of the rail 17 extends through a mating slot 22 in a back panel 23 of the cabinet structure 16. Each support bracket 18 is a short section of angle iron construction with a vertical flange 24 welded to the side walls 12 of the oven liner while a horizontal flange 25 is adapted to slide on the top surface of the horizontal flange 20 of the rail 17. An ear 26 is lanced out of the top portion of the vertical flange 19 of each rail 17 and is formed transversely of the bottom flange 20 adjacent the front of the range cabinet 16. This car 26 has a threaded opening 27 for receiw'ng a fastening screw 30 as is seen in FIGURE 2. A similar ear 28 is formed from the vertical flange 24 of the frontmost supporting bracket 18 and it has an enlarged opening 29 for loosely receiving the fastening screw 30. Notice in FIGURE 2 that the car 26 overlies the horizontal flange 25 of the front-most support bracket 18 and serves to hold down the bracket from rising ed the rails 17.

The oven liner is assembled in the range cabinet 16 in the following manner. First, batts of fiberglass insulation or the like are placed in the bottom of the cabinet and up the side and back walls since the horizontal cooktop (not shown) containing the several surface heating elements is not assembled to the cabinet until after the oven liner is assembled in place. The oven liner 10 is next lifted through a front opening of cabinet 16 and the horizontal flanges 25 of the support brackets 18 are positioned on the top surfaces of the horizontal flanges 20 of the slide rails 17 and the oven liner is pushed back into the cabinet. It is important to obtain an accurate positioning of the oven liner so that the oven door 14 will mate properly with the front opening thereof. Accordingly, the fastening screws 31) serve as an accurate adjustment of the depth to which the oven liner is forced into the insulation 15. Later the batts of insulation 15 will be folded over the top wall 13 of the liner and the cooktop can then be fastened to the cabinet.

It is well to provide an additional stabilizing force acting against the oven liner to prevent it from rocking on the slide rails 17 during shipment. This force is supplied by a pair of spaced tabs 31 (only one of which is shown) which extend forwardly from the bottom edge of the front of the oven liner and each has an elongated slot 32 for adjustably receiving a fastening screw 33 that is adapted to be threaded into the range cabinet 16.

Attention is directed to the fact that the oven liner as now described is supported at only a few spaced points having a limited area of contact with the range cabinet 16, and remotely from the door opening. These points are the four support brackets 18 and the two slotted tabs 31. This construction leaves a large gap between the front edge of the oven liner and the edge of the front opening of the cabinet. This gap is to be closed by a breaker frame 35 shown only in FIGURE 2. This frame is of continuous metal construction to serve as the throat or collar of the oven liner. It is generally of Z-shape in cross-section and its opposite edges are each wrapped with gasket material as and 37 respectively. The innermost gasket 36 nearest the oven cavity is a fiberglass gasket of woven tubular construction which will easily withstand the high oven temperatures in the vicinity of 950 F. The other gasket is a silicone rubber gasket 37 that is less able to stand such high temperatures but is better able to seal the oven cavity from the escape of smoke, odors and vapors generated during the heat cleaning cycle.

The oven door 14 has an inner door liner 40 which extends deeply through the open front of the oven liner and is supported from the inner surface of the door by a series of widely spaced fastening projections 41 so as to hold to a minimum the loss of heat from the oven cavity due to conduction through the metal parts of the door structure. Notice the fiberglass gasket 36 is sandwiched between a peripheral flange 38 that encircles the front edge of the oven liner, the side of the inner door liner 40 as well as against the oven door 14. Similarly, the silicone rubber gasket 37 is compressed between the front of the range cabinet 16 and the oven door 14. The breaker frame 35 is held in place by a series of spring clips 42 which are attached to the underside of the frame and are adapted to spring into slots 43 in the cabinet as is best seen in FIGURE 2. In other words a simple pressing force is all that is necessary to assemble the breaker frame by snapping the clips 42 into the slots 43.

Having described above my invention of a novel method of mounting an oven liner in a range cabinet so as to hold to a minimum the heat loss due to conduction around the door opening, it will be readily apparent to those skilled in this art that other locations could be found for the slide rails and supporting brackets. For instance, they could be placed at the top of the oven liner. This location is not quite as good because it does not give the side stability to the oven liner that the slide rails give as shown in the accompanying drawing. One additional reason for supporting the rails 17 and brackets 18 near the top of the oven liner is that the lost food soil accumulates in the bot-tom and lower sides and back wall of the liner. Since the brackets are supported on the rails, heat is lost through the brackets and these spots on the oven liner are cooler than others. Light food soil can be cleaned more readily at lower temperatures than heavy soil. Also, other methods may be used for fastening the breaker frame to the range cabinet while at the same time isolating it from thermal con-tact with the Walls of the oven liner, although the illustrated design was found to be particularly advantageous with the described liner mounting means.

Other modifications of this invention will occur to those skilled in this art and it is to be understood, therefore, that this invention is not limited to the particular embodiments disclosed but that it is intended to cover all modifications which are within the true spirit and scope of this invention as claimed.

What I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States is:

1. An oven construction comprising walls forming an oven liner of box-like configuration, thermal insulation surrounding the oven liner, walls forming an outer cabinet structure surrounding the insulation, the outer cabinet structure including a front opening through which the oven liner is adapted to be installed means for suspending the oven liner in the cabinet comprising slide rails supported from some of the inner surfaces of the walls of said cabinet structure and extending from front to back thereof, and complementary brackets fitted to some of the outer surfaces of the Walls of the oven liner for sliding support on the rails, and adjustable clamping means between some of the oven liner brackets and the rails of the cabinet to position and fasten the oven liner in place.

2. An oven construction as recited in claim 1 wherein additional fastening tabs are provided at the front of the oven liner for attachment to the cabinet for stabilizing and holding down the liner in the outer cabinet.

3. An oven construction comprising an oven liner that has a bottom wall, vertical side walls, a top wall and a back wall, where the front of the oven liner is adapted to be closed by an oven door, thermal insulation surrounding the walls of the oven liner, and walls forming an outer cabinet surrounding the insulation, means for mounting the oven liner in the cabinet comprising slide rails supported from some of the inner surfaces of the walls of the cabinet adjacent the top thereof and extending from front to back, and brackets fitted to some of the outer surfaces of the walls of the oven liner for sliding support on the rails, and adjustable clamping means between at least some of the brackets and support rails for holding the oven liner in place.

4. An oven construction comprising walls forming an outer cabinet having opposed side walls and a front opening, walls forming an oven liner of box-like configuration with opposed side walls fitted into said front opening of the cabinet, and thermal insulation surrounding the oven liner and being sandwiched between the oven liner and the walls of the cabinet, means for mounting the oven liner in the cabinet comprising slide rails supported on said opposite side walls of the cabinet and extending from front to back thereof, and spaced brackets fitted to the outer surfaces of the side walls of the oven liner for sliding support on the rails, and adjustable fastening means between the front of the oven liner and the cabinet for adjusting the position of the oven liner with respect to the outer cabinet and fastening the oven liner in place.

5. An oven construction as recited in claim 4 wherein said oven liner is provided with a front opening and a door for closing said opening, there being a thermal barrier between the periphery of the front edge of the oven liner and the outer cabinet comprising a metal breaker frame that is insulated with strips of insulation to space the breaker frame from direct contact with the oven liner the outer cabinet and the oven door, and quickly detachable connecting means formed on said breaker frarne for engagement with the walls of said cabinet for holding the breaker frame in its operative position.

6. An oven construction comprising an oven liner, thermal insulation surrounding the oven liner, and an outer cabinet surroundnig the insulation, the oven liner having a bottom wall, parallel vertical side Walls, a top Wall, and a back wall with an open front that is adapted to be closed by an oven door, means for thermally isolating the front of the oven liner from the cabinet structure comprising a breaker frame that serves as a collar and extends around the complete periphery of the open front of the oven liner, thermal insulation supported by the opposite edges of the breaker frame for spacing the breaker frame fromthe oven liner and from the outer cabinet and the oven door, said breaker frame including spring clips on the back side thereof which are adapted to fit into slots formed in the cabinet structure to provide a hidden quick-attachment means for the breaker frame to the oven structure.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,405,305 Hennessy et a1 Aug. 6, 1946 2,644,607 Hinkel July 7, 1953 2,663,916 Millman Dec. 29, 1953 2,695,729 Hornish Nov. 30, 1954 

